


Sigh of Goodbye

by oponn



Category: Daredevil (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Punisher (TV 2017)
Genre: Angst, F/M, Frank Can't Love Karen, Karen Gets It, Sucks Tho, Unresolved Feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-28
Updated: 2016-11-28
Packaged: 2018-09-02 19:06:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8679862
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oponn/pseuds/oponn
Summary: "If Frank Castle is dead, why are you here?" She asked him in a tone of defeat. Her shoulders slumped and she finished her thought, "The Punisher doesn't care whether Karen Page lives or dies. Frank did."





	

Karen Page didn't park her car in dark corners.  

She never left the doors unlocked and kept nothing of any personal identification inside save for three cassette tapes. She always parked it under lights, near exits and stairwells and fire alarms.  

Karen even checked the back windows before she unlocked and entered the car to make sure she had no pop-ups in the back seat. She did all of these things this time too and settled herself in the front seat of her old beater, reaching around the wheel to fiddle with the key she'd inserted into the ignition.  

She turned the keys and struggled for a few moments, painfully aware her solenoid was on the outs. Grunting with frustration in the small space, Karen tried again as she cursed through gritted teeth. Focused on the task of feeling for the catch as she listened intently for the engine, Karen shrieked and jumped as a sharp rap of knuckles on glass sounded from just to her right through the passenger window.  

She looked over, glimpsing the hip of black jeans and a black military looking jacket over what appeared to be a padded sweater on a male body. As if to answer her unprocessed question, Frank Castle's face under a black and grey baseball cap leaned down to look through the glass at her. He raised his eyebrows and lifted one thick finger and jabbed at the glass just above the door lock.  

Karen gaped, her jumpstarted heartbeat not slowing down a single iota after the realization that he was standing there hit her. Karen leaned over and mechanically popped the lock. The door was opened and Frank slid into the passenger seat before Karen had even fully recoiled back into her own seat to stare at him.  

He shut the door and they were suddenly in a parked car together for the first time in the better half of a year. Karen stared at Frank who resolutely looked ahead. His face was arranged into a typically Frank Castle scowl and he seemed to sit still while she looked at him, as if he was giving her time for something.  

Her last words to him hung between them like flaming sparkler letters. 

Frank's face was still Frank's. He was slightly thinner, the bags under his eyes slightly deeper and for whatever reason Karen felt no surprise to note that his face was a messy palette of blues, purples, greens and yellows. Layers of bruises. Layers of fighting.  

Layers made by time spent fighting. 

All the time Karen had spent writing for The Bulletin, chasing down stories and hoarding her sources and creeping around eavesdropping to build herself something after everything with Matt and the Hand happened. She needed to be her own person and contribute to something – whatever was going on, whatever was happening, whatever the bad in this city was trying to get away with. Karen couldn't fight with her fists but she could wage war another way.  

Frank had spent his time...literally fighting. Getting hurt. Getting punched, punching back. Shooting people. Stabbing people. Unbidden, the audio memory of one of the men from the diner that Frank had killed swam to the forefront of her mind - gurgling and coughing up blood. Karen had heard the blade being sunk into his flesh.  

He'd spent his time being The Punisher. She was suddenly reminded that it was he who sat in her car, murderous anti-hero vigilante. Not Frank Castle, ex-military and family man. Not her Frank; her friend.  

"You're walking around all bruised up like that?" Karen asked finally, letting her blue eyes slide over his face. As she said the words, he cracked a grin on one side of his mouth and finally looked at her. A wave of relief washed over her as she saw he still looked at her different than he had when she first met him.  

His eyes still softened slightly, somehow, when he looked at her. Sometimes he looked guilty, sometimes he looked remorseful, sometimes she'd seen flashes of things she knew she didn't understand. His visage was still gruff and hyper-masculine but he was still the same. He still looked like the man who wasn't a monster to her. She suddenly found she didn't know what she'd expected.  

"You'd be surprised of how much it disguises me," He replied in the same deep, rumbling voice that very much still sounded like Frank and not a psycho-monster. Karen shook her head to herself and she struggled with containing a snort. 

"You'd be surprised how not surprising that is actually. Fr- uhm, why are you in my car?" Kare stumbled over his name and from his look he noticed. She crossed her arms over her chest to help backup her attitude. 

"You need to leave town."  

Karen blinked and gaped at him. Frank's eyes went between hers for a few moments before he resumed looking out the cars windows around them.  

"Why?" Karen demanded.  

"There's someone after you."  

"...I...what? No, I'm not involved in anything that you _think_ I am. I'm not talking to people or...or...," Karen began and Frank sat up and raised his hand slightly as he opened his mouth to argue in return but Karen cut him off by shaking her head twice.  

"No. I'm not." 

"You can't risk being around for anything that might happen."  

Karen's brain was thinking fast and for once the reporter in her seized upon a clue in the murk and she jerked her head to him, bright blue eyes flashing angrily.  

"How can you know I'm in danger when you're not around? Where....where are you going to be that there will even be a chance that something will happen?"  

"I'm dead to you, ma'am, I haven't been around because I'm not a ghost," Frank answered her shortly without looking her directly in the eyes. He intently stared into shadows and depths of every  corner of the parking garage. For some reason, those words hit her harder than any blow she'd sustained physically. Blinking forcefully, Karen faced forwards and put her face into a wooden mask. Silence hung between them as they both sat. Frank's eyes searched for enemies and Karen's dropped two clear tears that were hastily wiped on the cuff of her long sleeve. 

"You blew up your goddamn house Frank," She finally snapped raggedly and he looked at her sharply. Karen now looked at him, eyes red-rimmed with smothered emotions and her lips pulled away from her teeth slightly. A small voice quietly warned her who she was hackling at and she felt herself throw caution out the window.  

"You killed your only chance at...at _anything_ in that shack! You walked away from understanding and leniency. You deserve to be in prison and you know it and you know that your only chance at redemption or justice -," Karen was cut off as Frank chuckled darkly and shot her a nasty lopsided grin. She bristled at the condescension as he spoke casually.  

"My redemption? _Your_ redemption you mean. Forgive the monster in me, forgive the monster in yourself right?" He told her pointedly.  

Karen made a slightly strangled noise in the back of her throat and he glowered at her, momentarily looking as if he regretted having to have said what he apparently thought out loud.  

"You really are The Punisher, aren't you?" She finally managed softly. He sighed heavily and Karen scoffed and fumbled for the door handle, clambering out of the car and slamming the door behind her. She heard the passenger open and close as she walked the length of the car and went to storm to the stairwell. There was a subway station a block away.  

Frank's hand grasped her upper arm, lifting her shoulder and guiding the side of her body up and off balance. Karen's hand had already moved and she swung into it him as she withdrew her snub nosed pistol from her coat pocket. His dark eyes flashed with anger and his nostrils flared as she pressed the cold metal underneath his strong jawline. He tilted his chin and glared at her from the side of his eyes.  

"You going to blow my head off now?" He shot at her and squeezed her captive arm tightly.  

"Who do you have watching me?" Karen hissed at him and he smirked slightly. He seemed to still his body and casually wait for her to be done with her display of emotion.  

"Is this really necessary? You're worried about me having a bruised face and you get all Bonnie Parker in a parking lot?" Frank answered her question with his own as Karen ripped her arm free. Worry flashed through her as she realized he wasn't concerned she had a loaded firearm to his head.   

"I can take care of myself, see? I'm not going anywhere," Karen said with a hint of doubt in her voice that she tried to cover by narrowing her eyes. Frank chuckled again, seemingly in good spirits.  

"You've pointed a gun at me more than three times and on none of those occasions have you pulled the trigger. Considering who I am, I disagree with the safety statement," He explained to her nonchalantly. As soon as he was done speaking, he moved faster than lightning. Her arms were wrenched and her wrists gave a sharp twang and she found herself stumbled back a few inches and Frank now disassembling her handgun without looking. The metal pieces clanged and clattered to the cement ground.  

"Frank..." Karen said haltingly as he stared at her.  

"No, no more girl power speeches. Someone knows where you live. He can hurt you," Frank said flatly and his eyes were momentarily wild and hard at the same time. "If a dead man can take your gun, you're no safer than a child on the street."  

"You're not _dead_!" Karen finally snapped, tossing an exasperated hand in his direction.  

He opened his mouth and she cut him off again.  

"That's the entire reason this entire conversation is _stupid_! It's all more lies and fear all in the noble name of _protecting Karen Page_ and I'm not just letting this happen **to**  me anymore, Frank. You can blow up everything you want, you can revenge murder all the people you want and you can alienate all the _friends_  you want but don't you dare ever try to tell me that you're fucking **_dead_**!" She shrieked at him, blue eyes shooting daggers and her lips shiny with saliva from her outburst. She began to pace again, in front of him, and didn't look away for a second.  

"Trust me, I get it. I get the whole putting your painful life to sleep thing and becoming The Punisher," Karen ranted, dropping her voice theatrically over his tabloid name. "But could you just for one goddamn _fucking_  second recognize that you survived for a reason and that reason wasn't to pretend you're not who you are? The Punisher wouldn't be doing half the shit you're doing if you hadn't experienced your family – if you hadn't loved Maria you wouldn't be half the broken cretin you are now. You can't just pick and choose which parts of that narrative have or have not made you up. There's...there's no way to get to The Punisher if there's no Frank Castle," Karen trailed off to gasp in air due to the vehemence of her rant. Frank had leaned back against the trunk of the car and had his hands in the pockets of his jacket. His face was unreadable.  

She tried again.  

"If Frank Castle is dead, why are you here?" She asked him in a tone of defeat. Her shoulders slumped and she finished her thought, "The Punisher doesn't care whether Karen Page lives or dies. Frank did."  

His eyes slid closed briefly, like he was flinching from a slap. Then he thinned his lips as he exhaled loudly and flexed the muscles in his jaw. Karen tried to steady her breathing, now feeling very exhausted. Those words and thoughts had built up so much on the inside of her head that saying them to his face felt like a huge weight coming off her chest. Then something in her brain clicked.  

Him shooting off the rooftop above her head.    
His seeming insight into Matt's psyche in the diner.    
An unnamed observer that was trusted by a rabid dog like The Punisher?  

Everything clicked into place and something in her broke in a way that it was like a statue that had retained it's prior shape before the spreading cracks collapsed the entire piece.  

"...Y...you're not here for me or for Frank, are you? Matt sent you. Daredevil sent you," She answered herself as her eyes filled with tears. "You weren't lying. You don't care; you really are dead."  

He merely looked back at her with tough, strained eyes. Even if this was agony for him, she knew he'd be outside of it to make sure he didn't give in and to ensure she kept her distance. That was his idea of protection. Karen found a small part of herself feeling a very real approximation of hatred because of his silence. For him or for her own clinging hope, she wasn't sure. All she knew was all of a sudden she felt like the black hole in her chest was going to open up and suck everything into it in a gale of despair.  

"He sent me because he knows you'll leave the city. Either you'll come with me or.... I'll take you." Frank answered her with the familiar note of calming only he had.  

Karen let out a laugh was waterlogged through the sobs that she was trying to quell.  

"Lies or abduction, choose your kink huh?" She let out another breathy, disbelieving laugh. She rounded on Frank as he approached her. 

"I'll do it. Fine. I'll go. I can take a hint. I'll come back next week. No one knows my Mom is dead, maybe she'll have a health scare. The world is full of endless possibilities, isn't it?" Karen demanded and he frowned down at her, searching her face for the deceit in her sudden change of heart.  She squared her jaw and forced herself to look him straight in the eyes as she nervously tucked a lock of strawberry blonde hair behind her ear. Frank's eyes were pulled down as she licked her lips and then returned to her eyes, suddenly wary at the decision on her face.  

"I'll go on my own, I promise. You can check my apartment later, I'll leave a window unlocked. I won't tell a soul where I'm going and I'll pay for everything in take out cash, just like you do," Karen explained softly as he stepped closer to her to hear. He was so close she could see his pupils against the dark brown of his irises. She could smell him and he smelled like coffee and rainwater - outside world more outside than a parking garage. He hadn't shaved in a few days and she could see the harsh bristle that had burst from his skin. Karen hesitated with the impulse and then raised her hand between them to touch the scruff on his jaw.  

Frank stood still, dark eyes watching her closely and allowing the pads of her fingers to travel up his cheek and slide along his temple. Karen found him warm and plainly human, so unlike any godly killing machine or Supermarine. Longing filled her chest, a want for the human part of him that was so evident the first time she'd met him in the hospital. So guarded and tense but still so emotional and conscious. Frank Castle had been right underneath the surface when she'd just thought to maybe learn about the man himself instead of his deeds. Now it felt like he was a million miles away, locked behind thick walls of conviction and higher calling.  

"I don't know if I can trust that promise."  

"An exchange then," Karen replied immediately as colour climbed high in her cheeks. He noticed and studied her even harder as if he was trying to work out exactly what she was thinking. She spied the second he'd succeeded.  

"Karen-," Frank said in a voice of warning. Karen moved closer, lifting her face to his and looking him in the eyes. She gave him a sad, flickering smile as her eyes slid down his face. He seemed to still, like he'd stopped breathing as her breasts brushed his chest.  

"Tell me to stop then," She whispered back at him as she brought her face so close to his they were sharing the same air. His lips opened for a brief second and then faltered closed and she didn't need any other weakness.  

Her lips met his and found his response already waiting. He met her kiss with their lips melting together as he nudged his mouth against hers gently. Karen was fairly tall but still had to raise up on her tip toes and had placed one of her hands on his chest, idly gathering some of the material between her fingers for stability. His hands gently rested on her waist, no movement or grabbing. No insistence or resistance.  

But as she moved her lips over his and he responded, Karen found herself playing with fire. His kiss became less controlled with a suck on his lower lip, his tongue was ready when she flickered hers against his mouth and he dominated her explorations in response. Pressed together, she felt his heartbeat in his chest and felt her own desire create an urge to rock her hips up against his groin. The hand on his face sank into his hair and scraped her short nails across his scalp and Frank seemed to hiss into her mouth and kiss her harder. His hands fisted in her jacket and he pulled her harder against him before they clamped down over her upper arms. Karen was drugged, responding languidly to his surprisingly electric reaction to her invasion of his space. She was getting a taste of a similar bereaved desperation from him and she delighted in it, knowing it couldn't purely come from stimulation overload. His hands squeezed her upper arms again and then he broke away to press his forehead against hers. They both took a few seconds to suck in some air. 

"Satisfied?" He muttered.  

"Kinda made me feel worse I think," Karen replied raggedly as she stepped away and soaked her hand through her own hair. Her now sapphire eyes flashed to his inky black ones and she offered him a shrug.  

"Heroin feels good too I guess."  

Frank's eyes sank closed for a second and he swallowed before looking at her with a fresh sadness she didn't know he was capable of.  

"My family...Since I met you...It's not possible...I haven't ever been able-," He started and stopped and Karen raised her hand in tandem with her eyebrows and gave him an incredulous look before a serious one.  

"I'm more than aware. There's no way it would float, my Dad used to say, the hole in this ship is too big," She laughed wetly and his face pinched in concern as he noticed fresh tears wet her eyes. He grasped her upper arms again and drew her to him to press his lips against her forehead softly. Karen sighed and shut her eyes gratefully. He lingered, almost like he was breathing her in.  

"You don't _have_  to be dead. We could just be friends," Karen tried in a small voice from beneath him. He squeezed her and straightened her up. She kept her eyes down, suddenly not able to see any type of rejection on his face.  

She heard him exhale heavily before he stepped away from her.  

"Leave tonight."  

When she opened her eyes, both The Punisher and Frank Castle were gone.  

**Author's Note:**

> SAD PANDA
> 
> as much as i 100% would love for these two to sail into the sunset, this ship is built to wreck. friends at best and it's so delightfully tragic. this is my imagining of the hard conversation that would happen between them. i still want a happy ending but like...we all know it probably won't happen.


End file.
